C R I T I C I S M

HOW TO CRITICIZE & HOW TO RESPOND TO CRITICISM

“People ask you for criticism, but they only want praise.” -  Somerset Maugham

I believe we are all our own worst critics. We start to criticize ourselves as soon as early childhood. We don’t like the way we look or we don’t like our nose, the color of our hair or skin, or weight or our height. Over time, we learn to live with what we have but we become very sensitive about them. When somebody makes a comment or criticizes us about these attributes, it upsets us very much and to we tend to overreact.

I remember that I started losing my hair in my late twenties. I was very upset and blamed my father’s heredity for it. My father was a bald man. One day, one of my friend commented about it, by saying, ”how come you are losing your hair? You are becoming a bald man.” I responded angrily by saying, ”because God created a few intelligent minds, the rest He covered with more hair, just like yours.” As you can imagine, my comments created an unpleasant atmosphere for the rest of the evening.

It appears that receiving criticism or criticizing somebody else is not an easy task, because we never know how the other person will react to our criticism. Therefore, we tend to hold back our criticism and comments and remain silent. But this attitude, over time, starts building resentment in us. We start to criticize and belittle ourselves that we are afraid, we are easily intimidated or that we are not intelligent enough.

For this reason, it is better for us to speak our mind but always in a thoughtful and constructive way and without hurting anybody’s feelings. An ancient Arabic saying tells us that before we criticize someone, it must pass through three gates:

1.    Is it true?

2.    Is it necessary?

3.    Is it kind?

We should always remember that to be kind is more important than to be right. We should never criticize anyone for the things that they can’t do anything about. We should never criticize anybody in front of other people. We should never criticize anyone behind their back for two reasons - first, they are not there to defend themselves and second, behind the back criticism changes, becomes gossip and somehow reaches that person in a worse form. There is a Turkish saying in this regard, it states that the ground has ears; everybody hears what you are saying behind their back.

Receiving a criticism is not easy to handle either. Because we have a tendency to always criticize ourselves, we are very sensitive about receiving any criticism. We are in need to hear something good about ourselves not criticism.

When we receive a criticism, before we react emotionally to defend ourselves, we must be disciplined enough to find out few facts about the criticism and do the following:

1.    We must be aware of our emotions induced by the criticism and try to control them.

2.    Who is the person criticizing us? He or she could be a family member, a good friend or our boss. Sometimes it is better to remain silent, not to react.

3.    Is criticism true and constructive? If it is, we should say ”thank you, I stand corrected.”

4.    If the criticism is unfair or destructive then we should respond. But our response should be civil. It should never turn into a shouting match, never be generalized and be limited to the present event.

5.    If no understanding is present during the discussions, it should not continue and it should end with and agree to disagree statement.

6.    Response reaction and arguments should never be done on the phone or in writing because it is very important to see the facial expression and body language of the other person.

So, now that you know what to do about criticism, you would become a better liked person among your friends and in your community.